UNEXPECTED GOODNESS

The most famous pigeon in history: Cher Ami

Cher Ami, French for “dear friend,” was a homing pigeon, one of 600 English-bred birds donated to the U.S. Army Signal Corps in France to help deliver important messages during World War 1. He is most famous for traveling over 40 km (25 miles) to deliver a message from an encircled battalion (“The Lost Battalion”) despite being shot through the breast, blind in one eye, and covered in blood with a severed leg hanging by one tendon. The message that dangled from his injured leg ultimately saved 194 lives. Today, the little hero of the 77th Infantry Division has been mounted by a taxidermist in the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in its “Price of Freedom” exhibit.

~National Museum of American History